DETROIT — It's impossible to talk about the Winter Classic without focusing on the weather and ice conditions. If the Alumni Showdown at Comerica Park on Tuesday was any indication, things should go well 45 minutes down the road on New Year's Day.

For the first alumni game between the Detroit Red Wings and Toronto Maple Leafs, temperatures hovered around 20 degrees. It'll be about the same on Wednesday, with the potential for more snow — and believe it or not, ice is better when it's cold. We've seen the flip side of that over the years. The puddles at Heinz Field in 2011 come to mind; when temperatures are above freezing and it's raining, there's not much to do.

"I thought the ice was great," Maple Leafs center Tom Fergus said."It's got a different feel to it when it's outdoors, but it actually feels harder."

Red Berenson, who skated (and played well) for the Red Wings at 74 years old, has coached his share of outdoor games with the University of Michigan, and he signed off on the job done by Dan Craig.

"The temperature was perfect. The ice was excellent. That's the best venue that I've played in an outdoors (game), even as a coach, we played in four of them at Michigan, and I have to say, this is the best ice that we've had. Maybe because of a combination of the weather and the rink management," Berenson said. "You ask all the players, (and) there will be no complaints about the ice. It was fast."

Another factor: the sun. It was shining directly at Detroit's net at the start of the second period. That's been a factor before — you'll see a lot of guys wearing football-style eye black at Michigan Stadium for that reason. Wednesday's game, like the first at Comerica, will start around 1 p.m.

"We were telling the guys, whoever is going down the right wing to shoot the puck or even lob it in, because if you hit the right angle, the goalie probably wouldn't have a chance to see it," Toronto's Stew Gavin said.